It’s sweet 16 for PSPB men
Petroleum Sports Promotion Board men put up yet another title-winning performance, for the 16th occasion, to rout Railway Sports Promotion Board 3-0 in the final of the LPS Bossard 47th all India inter-institutional championships at the Table Tennis Foundation hall in the capital on Thursday.
Earlier, their women squad added their 14th crown after beating RBI 3-1. A day before, PSPB boys had won the Youth championship in what was a profitable venture as they qualified for the nationals to be held at Varanasi. However, the PSPB girls had to be content with the silver as RBI upstaged them to grab the gold and seal their entry into the nationals.
Both finals did not reach the dizzy heights as they had turned out to be a completely one-sided affair. If there was some interested generated in the women’s team finals, it was all thanks to Ayhika Mukherjee’s win over Manika Batra, but none of it could be seen the men’s final.
G. Sathiyan, in a zone of his own, finished his singles against Anirban Nandi in style and in double quick time. The veteran Railways player could not put up even a semblance of resistance against the rampaging Sathiyan. Equally disappointing was the second rubber when Soumyajit Ghosh went through the motions against Ravindra Kotiyan. The tall and lanky RSPB paddler, who promised a lot until a couple of years ago, was unable to shake off self doubts and play freely. This was evident against the shrewd Ghosh who disposed of him in straight games.
The third singles between Harmeet Desai and E. Prabhakaran also went the PSPB way as one had anticipated. Prabhakaran, a gritty fighter, managed to win the second game, but the aggressive Harmeet did not give any liberty in the third and in the next to shut out whatever little challenge seemed to be brewing.
Despite an indifferent start provided by Manika Batra — she lost her opening rubber to Ayhika Mukherjee — PSPB had the bench strength to pull it off without much ado as Madhurika Patkar, who both her singles, first defeated Akula Sreeja and then accounted for Ayhika.
In between Pooja Sahasrabuddhe ensured that she did her job to perfection, beating Amrutha Pushpak.
Manika, who lost to Takeme Sarkar in the semi-final, seemed to have gone into a shell after taking the first game.
Ayhika, relatively inexperienced as compared to the former national champion, not only levelled the score but went on to mount pressure and Manika got buried under its weight. Madhurika, leading the charge, had to retrieve the situation and she won the second rubber.
This gave Pooja the impetus to go for the kill against Amrutha. Yet, the latter took her to some distance in a fighting third game, which the former won 16-14. Returning to the table, Madhurika completed the demolition task rather easily.